Nature Folks

I had already taken a picture of these little guys I bought many years ago at a Waldorf fair to post when my preordered copy of “Wonder Art Workshop” by Sally Haughey of Fairy Dust Teaching arrived yesterday. It is a beautiful book with many wonderful ideas for creating with young children. I was especially drawn to “Workshop 7 – Nature Folks” which suggests using peg body forms, beads, pinecones and other items from nature to create nature fairies and people. According to Sally a product called heavy matte gel medium is strong enough to glue things together so that children can make things that adults usually use glue guns to make. I can’t wait to try it with my grandchildren. In addition to materials from nature I plan to offer some other materials. I think the characters above are wrapped in the fiber I use for felting and they have pipe cleaner arms. My favorite thing about them is that the acorn tops they are holding are filled with tiny sparkly beads. The flower fairies I’ve made are dressed in fabric flowers and have pipe cleaner arms and legs.

I originally made their wings with wire and old pantyhose but then I started using craft store butterfly wings and I still have some of them to offer. I can’t wait to see what my grandchildren create when they come for their first overnight the weekend after next.